Reminder
by Aliylah
Summary: This is about House and cuddy's relatioship, how it evolved and why they act the way they do.


It was a long time ago that you two began to speak to each other in harsh tones. It was a long time ago that all communication between the two of you would be strained to the pointed of breaking. But it had been longer since you two had been anything but careful. And this, the words, and the pains, were ll just another form of care. The careful kind of caring, but still care. And after all, if there were something between you that was nice, something that was platonic, everything would become platonic. It wasn't just for his sake, you are both easily bored to tears, and that wasn't something you wanted for anyone, but especially not for him.

You are sitting in a nice restaurant, and then suddenly you get cramped. You can't stand the yellow light and body heat, so you walk outside, and wrap your arms around you because it's snowing and you're wearing a turtleneck. And then he walks over to you from his car. His strut isn't exactly graceful, and you tell him as much. He smiles and you both know that it's better that you live the way you de, because you have tipped the scales. In fact, you have completely flipped them over, and suddenly the two of you are stuck somewhere more than affection, but less than resignation. There is this place in between where a kind smile and a respectful gesture would tear apart everything you both have worked a long time for.

Surprisingly he has worked longer than you have, because for the longest time you didn't understand. And then you saw him in person and the reports you had been getting fell into place, because you were in public, and somehow he had pretended for a long time that it was the injury that had changed him, but actually he was doing it for you, because somehow he had known that you would always be in public, and because he was just that good.

And then you realized, that the last time you would ever argue with him and really feel angry was when you were telling at him to stop being such a stubborn ass, and he was telling you, flippantly, that he liked his leg more than his life. You hadn't wanted to hit him that badly since college.

You told Cameron that he was a legend by the time you got there, but SHE had assumed that it meant something. In truth, he had been your conquest. Because while he slept with anything with legs, he had never been interested in any of them, and you never waked away from a challenge. He had been sitting in a restaurant like the one you just left, and you had seated yourself without asking and taken a sip of his drink. It was awful, and the face you made set him laughing, and while at the time you had been embarrassed, thinking back you are damn glad you took a huge sip. When he had finished laughing, you told him that you were here to ask him about a paper he had written, and while you actually were unsure that he had come to the right conclusions in the paper, that wasn't why you were here, and though you had good points and once in a while left him without anything to say, he wasn't really interested in him until you told him that you had lied and he had believed you. Then he was hooked, you two found niches and topics and spent countless afternoons jumping from topic to topic hoping the other wouldn't lose your pace. And while sometimes politics lost him, and technical medicines drove you in circles, you both did fairly well.

It was then that you realized he wasn't in the right time in your life. And he realized that you were going to be with him for a long time. Incidentally you both tried to break up with each other and the same day, and neither of you could get a word in sideways of the other's nervous chattering. You broke first, but it was better that way because you are far more capable at begin gentle. His laughter was the most beautiful thing you had ever heard, but the occasion didn't make it any more beautiful than it always was.

So you parted and then when he came to your hospital with Stacy in tow, you had yelled at him and the fire in your voice had disguised that you really still felt he was a part of you, and that those hours you had spent yelling at him about school and politics had made you closer to knowing him than any other soul ever would be.

And then when he finally was better, before Stacy left, but after you knew she was going to, he became bitter and harsh, and you couldn't understand why until he showed up at a job interview and his tone stopped you from hugging him and proving that you hired him because he was him, not because he was the best candidate. And then suddenly you understood, and you began to play along. You screamed and groaned and no one in the hospital ever caught on. And then when time caught up with you and you weren't a real doctor anymore and you finally had time to be comfortable and introduce a relationship into you life, there he was waiting for you and you realized that if you ever let him in you'd be ruined because he would tear down everything that made you stable and able to run the hospital. He would kill that part of you that was willing to stay late and come in early because the life you were finally ready to have would still have to come second to your job.

Your J. O. B. that you couldn't do without and you couldn't' do anything with. So you kept playing this game, this war, and you kept saying things you didn't mean, and he kept doing things that drove you nuts, and you were often glad that he was the one stuck with the job of action because you didn't think you could hack it. Then again, he always managed to pull things out of you that you didn't know you had. Sometimes he also knew how to make things hurt you didn't know you had, but every once in a while he would also leave you with memories to soothe the ache. More often than not, he didn't. More often than not, you're glad. Because the moment one of you says something that passes for cordiality there is a flux in the balance you have created and what you have morphs into something else. The ice you have cut so beautifully as you feelings for him, flames and leaves smoke to keep you warm at night. And while ice isn't the best thing to hang on to in the cold, it has this wonderful numbing quality that is sometimes more comforting than heat. Those are the times that count; the ones that make you laugh, and cry, and wish you were dead, because those are the ones you wake up from and remember why what you have is special and why it isn't going to flame out. Because you two keep yourselves at such a distance that you two are the only ones that know each other well enough to see through the smoke and mirrors you pretend to have, in order to hide the ice.

He walks by and stops when he sees you standing in the cold.

"Careful, you wouldn't want to catch cold." She only pays attention to the first word. "You might have to be away from the hospital, and it would wither and die in those days without you." She's obsessive, but things really would fall apart were she to leave, and she's a better person for all her OCD.

"You know, you could always come home with me." He wiggles his eyebrows, "I could keep you warm." You scoffs.

"House, if I went home with you, I'd get to the hospital so early that Cameron would think I cared too much." You both know the opposite is true.

"Ouch, doctor you might just have to buy me dinner for that remark." You smirk, and hold the door.

"I appreciate the silence there." And You laugh. You don't buy him dinner, but he eats yours.

As You sit, you both think about what a bloody battle it is that you wage. You think about every time he admires your ass because it would be inappropriate for him to admire your eyes or smile. You think about how he acts in ways that endanger patients to that you can have your daily screaming matches, as that's the only contact you're allowed.

You both think about how much it kills you when patients die, but you let him do as he pleases because when they do die, he mocks you about how it's not your fault and you blame yourself though they weren't yours to save. And every time he says it you know that he really means himself instead of the nameless patients that pass though your doors. You know he really means that he doesn't blame you for what happened, and moreover he's not your sinner to save, because he still knows that you'll be with him for a long time, and you realize that it's more that he's not right for you more than the time isn't right. Unfortunately, he's the only one that will ever pass for close to right, and you both know it.

So as you leave he calls you a dirty name and you glare at him. And he tells you your eyes will stick that way, but you know he really just doesn't like you to downplay your eyes. And you'll both play at this game forever because a victory would mean one of you wasn't equal to the other and both of you are easily bored to tears, and because like the first time you met, it's not that you can keep up with him that matter. The hard part is remembering you're supposed to. Thankfully, you have daily reminders, every time you put a patient's life on the line you are really saying, "I remember." And every time he saves a patient through the most mind-blowing breath taking stunt you have ever seen (at least since he did it last week), He is saying, "That's good." And so you play this war and every battle kills you a little bit more, but the hardest part is walking away, sending him out of your office, because the only time you ever really feel alive is when he is reminding you.


End file.
